Why Does the Air Force Want Drone Swarms?

[rangerrebew]

November 2, 2019

Why Does the Air Force Want Drone Swarms?

The high-tech future of war.
by Kris Osborn

Key point: A large number of cheap drones could be very useful for fighter planes.
 

Advances in computer power, processing speed and AI are rapidly changing the scope of what platforms are able to perform without needing human intervention.

The Air Force and DARPA are now testing new hardware and software configured to enable 4th-Generation aircraft to command drones from the cockpit in the air, bringing new levels of autonomy, more attack options and a host of new reconnaissance advantages to air warfare.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/why-does-air-force-want-drone-swarms-92271

[sneakypete]

For the simple reason they are cheap,and a dozen drones are harder to knock out of commission than one drone.

[Elderberry]

The Looming Swarm

Air Force Magazine by Amy McCullough April 2019

http://www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/2019/April%202019/The-Looming-Swarm.aspx

Roper took over the Air Force’s top technology job in February 2018, after nearly six years at the Defense Department’s Strategic Capabilities Office, where he oversaw development of the Perdix program, among other new technologies.

Perdix are expendable, micro-drones that can be pushed out the back of a variety of military aircraft and fly ahead of larger, more expensive remotely piloted aircraft or manned aircraft to conduct intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions. The Strategic Capabilities Office, in partnership with Naval Air Systems Command, tested the advanced swarming capability in 2016, launching more than 100 of the micro-drones from three F/A-18 Super Hornets over Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif.

“Due to the complex nature of combat, Perdix are not preprogrammed synchronized individuals, they are a collective organism, sharing one distributed brain for decision-making and adapting to each other like swarms in nature,” Roper said at the time. “Because every Perdix communicates and collaborates with every other Perdix, the swarm has no leader and can gracefully adapt to drones entering or exiting the team.”

More at link.

[Smokin Joe]

For the simple reason they are cheap,and a dozen drones are harder to knock out of commission than one drone.

Quantity has a quality all its own. Semiautonomous drone swarms could be an overwhelming force, capable of maneuvers no human pilot can endure.

Difficult to detect and avoid, they could F.O.D. out an enemy's engines without any warning.